Quill: The Life of a Guide Dog

Quill is a labrador puppy, born with a wing-shaped mark on his side. He is taken from his mother to be trained as a guide dog: first he is raised by a volunteer family, then he goes into training. When it is finished he is matched with Watanabe, who is blind. Watanabe wants nothing to do with the arrangement; he does not want to trust the dog and does not want to become attached to him. Months pass. Then the man falls ill and Quill is given to another household. Over the years he lives in three different places. Yōichi Sai directs the Japanese film; a hundred minutes, with Kaoru Kobayashi as Watanabe. It is adapted from the photo book of the same name, which follows the life of a real guide dog. The film is not built on how appealing the dog is; it is about how long a job raising a guide dog is, and how many people it takes.